Features » January 9, 2006

Cult of Character

How the ‘secular’ Character Training Institute is working to build evangelist Bill Gothard’s vision of a First-Century Kingdom of God–one city, one state, one school board, one police force and one mind at a time.

Email this article to a friend

your email

your name

recipient(s) email (comma separated)

message

captcha

Research support for this article was provided by the Investigative Fund of The Nation Institute.

From the outside the bland, unmarked exterior of the Character Training Institute’s headquarters blends remarkably well into its immediate surroundings. This is a section of Oklahoma City that hasn’t yet benefited from the nearby, upscale urban development intended to draw both tourism and business to the area. Both the downtown Greyhound Station and the county jail are situated a few blocks from here, which explains the number of forlorn, transient men and women wandering down West Main Street. For the

most part these folks seem to have more immediate priorities than paying attention to the dozens of foreign-looking visitors entering and exiting the 10-story Character Training Institute (CTI), which also serves as the headquarters of the International Association of Character Cities (IACC).

But one elderly woman wearing mismatched clothing and a weathered plastic visor ambles across the street to get a closer look. She leans against the wall and tries to peer inside, but the heavy double doors, darkened windows and drawn shades make it nearly impossible to do so.

“What’s going on in there?” she asks a young man with a military-style haircut walking toward the door. He takes a polite moment to explain that this is a very important “Building Cities of Character” conference, sponsored by the IACC. Many people, he adds, have come from all over the world to be here. And with that, he disappears into the building. The woman tries, one last and unsuccessful time, to see what’s going on inside.

“The sin of witchcraft”

Inside the institute, Arizona state treasurer David Petersen takes to the conference podium to tell how his state’s Family Services Committee passed “Character Education Legislation.”

“All schools now have it implemented,” he says proudly. “We’re fighting for the soul of this nation.” Petersen is not being hyperbolic. He attributes his passion for “character” to a personal meeting with evangelist Bill Gothard.

Gothard, the 74-year-old, unmarried man at the head of the Oak-Brook, Illinois-based Institute in Basic Life Principles (IBLP)–which brings in an estimated profit of at least $63 million annually–has been in the evangelism business since 1964. Originally named the Institute in Basic Youth Conflicts, IBLP changed its name in 1990. All totaled, IBLP boasts that at least 2.5 million people have attended the organization’s seminars and ministries in the United States and other countries, including Russia, Mongolia, Romania and Taiwan.

Although legally and fiscally independent, the CTI is for all intents and purposes a “secular” front group for Gothard’s IBLP. In the last decade, the CTI has quietly gained entry into hundreds of elementary, middle and high schools, state and city offices, corporations, police departments and jails.

Though he never uses the term, Gothard’s ideology fits into the framework of the burgeoning “Christian Reconstructionist” movement, which aims to rebuild society according to biblical mandates. Within the Christian Reconstructionist worldview, modern-day chaos is directly attributable to the division of church and state and the consequent degradation of individual character.

For Gothard, the solution is restoring the United States–and then the rest of the world–to something that he calls “The Sevenfold Power of First-Century Churches and Homes.”

The concept of obeying God-granted authority runs through virtually all IBLP-published materials. “The key to understanding authority is identifying four areas of God-ordained jurisdiction: parents, government, church leaders, and employers,” reads an introductory passage to Basic Life Principles Seminar. “When a decision is to be made, we must ask, ‘Whose jurisdiction is this under?’ God gives direction, protection, and provision through human authorities. If we rebel against them, we expose ourselves to the destruction of evil principalities. … This is why ‘rebellion is the sin of witchcraft.’ “

According to Gothard’s interpretation, first century Roman Centurions were admirable figures of authority who followed their orders without question–the prototypes for the kinds of police officers that CTI instructor Ray Nash, the sheriff of Dorchester County, South Carolina, wants to create in his state and elsewhere.

Nash has conducted “Police Dynamics” training for numerous U.S. and international police departments.

“Really, what Police Dynamics is, in a nutshell, is biblical wisdom that’s been packaged into a law enforcement message,” Nash told Rev. Mark Creech in a November 2004 article for Alan Keyes’ RenewAmerica Web site.

Character Cities Conference

“Leaders around the world are increasingly concerned by the decline in society’s standards,” CTI founder Thomas A. Hill writes in his introduction to the brochure inviting people to the IACC conference. “As you reflect on the past, you may ask yourself, ‘Where did the good old days go?’ and ‘How did we get to this point?’ The answer is rooted in a growing lack of personal character.”

Anyone wanting to explore such questions and willing to fork over $360 for this annual three-day conference would be buzzed in through the double doors into an oddly serene and well-ordered environment.

Decorated in a faux-Victorian style, the lobby is spotless and dust-free, complete with displays of fake flowers in vases, rows of couches and psalm-quilted pillows. Low-level classical and hymnal music is piped in, but there are no television sets, radios or wall clocks to be seen. A busy group of young, unadorned women in ankle-length tan skirts, flats and dark polo shirts–and their adolescent male counterparts in pressed shirts and slacks–seem to make sure that everything runs on schedule. It doesn’t take long to notice that the female roles are rigidly secretarial and/or service-oriented.

When they arrive at the lobby desk, registrants are handed their Character First! plastic binders. The cover announces “a new paradigm for personal growth,” while the introductory letter from IACC Director Steven Menzel thanks attendees for their “commitment and determination to revitalize your community based upon the timeless attributes of character.”

Over the course of the next three days, attendees will come to learn that absolutely everything bad happening in our society–from crime to divorce, from drug use to school shootings–can be explained by lack of character.

Instilling character

The CTI was founded in 1996 by Kimray Oil and Gas tycoon Thomas A. Hill. A tax exempt, nonprofit educational organization, the institute’s mission is to instill 49 “Character Qualities” into four major civil institutions: family, business, education and law enforcement. In 1998 the CTI spread its wings and established the IACC, which aimed to make local governments “commit to develop character.”

The Character Cities concept has caught on quickly: 160 cities ranging from Compton, California, to Hamburg, New York, 31 counties, and seven states–Alabama, Arkansas, Delaware, Georgia, Ohio, Oklahoma and South Carolina–have now passed “character” resolutions and proclamations based on CTI’s teachings and materials.

Nor has the CTI’s influence been limited by American borders. Forty-seven international cities have already declared themselves Cities of Character, and at least one-third of the approximately 100 people attending the IACC conference arrived from foreign countries, including Romania, Mexico, Guatemala, Peru, Argentina, the Philippines and Sri Lanka.

Many have gone so far as to brand their localities with Character First! symbols, plaques, flags, pins, posters, brochures, books, mouse pads and calendars.

Understandably, the Character Training Institute tries to obfuscate the links between its work and Gothard’s reconstructionist Christian vision.

“This is not religion, these are character traits,” says John Thomas, vice president for global infrastructure services for Perot Systems Corporation, during one of three successive business-oriented presentations at the IACC conference.

Speakers emphatically and repeatedly stress that Character First! training has nothing to do with promulgating religion. Instead, attendees are told, the training promotes great character and, as a side benefit, drives up corporate profit margins. The Character First! DVD is chock-full of tales of incredible savings to businesses: Kimray’s Hill, for instance, talks of workers’ compensation dropping from $24,000 per month to a mere $2,000 to $4,000, while Todd Anderson, the vice president of C.P. Morgan, a home construction firm, brags about a tenfold increase in profitability attributable directly to CTI training.

The list of Character First! seminar attendees already reads like a who’s who of top corporations and government institutions: McDonald’s, Burger King, Aflac, Costco, Coca Cola, the Correctional Corporation of America, the Better Business Bureau, Tyson Foods, the U.S. Air Force, U.S. Navy, U.S. Marine Corps, U.S. Coast Guard, U.S. Bureau of Prisons, the Arkansas Prison System and the U.S. District Attorney’s office are all mentioned, in addition to more than a dozen school districts (including Denver, Memphis and Ft. Lauderdale), and eight healthcare companies and hospitals.

At the conference, attendees are told that the IACC exists “to support government and community leaders who want to develop character in themselves and encourage it in their families and communities.”

Oklahoma City–and the state of Oklahoma in general–seems to have truly taken this to heart. Here, even the local county jail’s elevators feature Character First! posters in Plexiglass displays, and juvenile detainees study character concepts with the jail chaplains. Each employee receives a Character Bulletin with his or her paycheck, explains Chaplain Argyle Dick. “We hire for character, and we fire, most of the time, for lack of character. … We are always looking for new ways to saturate even more of our employees with character.”

The Character Council of Central Oklahoma has even entered into a “covenant” with the regional career tech programs, covering 12 campuses. “That’s our plan for getting character qualities into the hearts and minds of all students,” explains Dr. Earlene Smith, the Education Committee chairman for the council.

Other examples abound throughout the conference: McDonough, Georgia, flies a City of Character flag outside of city hall; Owasso, Oklahoma, police squad cars sport a “City of Character” emblem on each vehicle; and the Character Council of Florida has ensured that all elementary schools will incorporate CTI training by 2006, and expand from there to higher grades.

Sign of the eagle

On the surface it does not appear as though Gothard is at all involved in the “secular” character training that the CTI provides to countless schools, city councils, state agencies, corporations and law enforcement agencies across the world. Hundreds of cities have also passed their own character resolutions, modeled on the IACC’s materials. None of the CTI/IACC materials mention Gothard’s name, but the more obvious attempts to hide the connections end there.

CTI founder Thomas Hill is also the board chairman for the IBLP–alongside other influential board members, such as Rep. Sam Johnson (R-Texas).

What do you want to see from our coverage of the 2020 presidential candidates?

As our editorial team maps our plan for how to cover the 2020 Democratic primary, we want to hear from you:

It only takes a minute to answer this short, three-question survey, but your input will help shape our coverage for months to come. That’s why we want to make sure you have a chance to share your thoughts.

Silja J.A. Talvi, a senior editor at In These Times, is an investigative journalist and essayist with credits in many dozens of newspapers and magazines nationwide, including The Nation, Salon, Santa Fe Reporter, Utne, and the Christian Science Monitor.

Obeying the speed limit. Telling the truth. Showing up for work on time. Who would have guessed that such an insidious agenda could be out there?

And I thought some people in the religious right were paranoid...

Posted by ew on 2013-05-07 12:26:26

Ok. It's been a while since you all submitted posts, but I just now came to this site.
I am a little bit confused at your stances. You very enlightened, intelligent, modern, open-minded, non-judgmental people read a very slanted and one-sided article and wrote these posts based on that one bit of evidence?
Have you even looked at the materials in question, or are you basing all of your arguments about this program based on your own biases, stereotypes, and personal prejudices?
You can quote philosophers and poets, discuss the failings of so many others, but you cannot even do basic research and intelligent fact gathering before you make a decision?
Your judgment of this program was a programmed response, full of biases, prejudices, and stereotypes, yet lacking in any intelligent research or facts about this program.
Shameful. Please go back to college, a decent one, where they teach you how to do research, follow facts, and use the scientific method properly. You just skipped the fact-gathering part of the process in your posts and jumped to hypothesis, and never cared to test your hypothesis with real facts.
I hope you feel good about your posts, because they did little else that is good.Posted by stickyrice on 2009-08-02 21:18:33

Would you prefer to live in a community to live in if the people are encouraged to tell the truth?
How about if people showed others that they cared about what they had to say by listening to them. Would that be a bad thing to promote.
If people in a community really cared about others and had hearts to, and made efforts to comfort others genuinely and do what they could to heal the hurts of others. Is that not something that people really desire.
I truly believe that displaying good character towards others is simply showing love to them.
Whether you call love religion or not is up to you, but what I strongly believe is that everyone wants to feel loved and cared about by others.
Clint DunnPosted by clintdunn35 on 2007-04-24 22:00:25

1. Transparency in government to include (a) declassification of ALL
official government records five years after the date of their
origin (exact, uncensored and unaltered duplicates might be filed,
at the time of their origin, with a special archivist and made
readily available to the public after the five year period has
expired) and (b) immediate and unrestricted access to all files,
records and offices of any federal department (when expressly
authorized by the full House) by a standing committee of five House
members composed of three from the majority party, two from the
minority, all of whom have been sworn not to divulge sensitive
information.
2. Elimination of the electoral college allowing presidential
elections to be decided directly by a majority of the popular vote.
3. Restriction on the number of times that a person may hold federal
elective office. I'd hold it to two terms, period, with one
exception permitted - a person who has held federal elective office
for two terms could subsequently occupy the office of president for
two terms. (I'd prefer, though a single six year term for president,
no re-election).
4. Revision of the system for electing Senators so that, in so far
as possible or practical, Senators would represent all the people,
fairly and equally (each Senator would ideally represent the same
number of people), through election by national or regional, rather
than state, constituencies. This might prove the most difficult
change to bring about, but perhaps the most important.
Alternatively, each state might retain its two senators as
prescribed by Article V, but Senators would have weighted votes
based on their state's population
5. Elimination of the unconscionable (and growing) disparity in the
distribution of wealth. This would require an aggressive, vigorous
policy of progressive taxation and absolute limitations on
inheritance.
6. Elimination of primary elections for national office with
candidates to be nominated by their political parties.
7. Supreme Court nominees (maybe candidates for all Federal
judgeships) to be proposed by the House, vetted by the President and
approved by the Senate. For example, the House might be allowed to
propose five candidates, the President to select two of the five,
and the Senate to approve one of the two (or to reject both in which
case the process would begin again). Both the President and the
Senate might be required to act within a certain time frame.
8. Equal television time for all major party candidates for Federal
elective office.
9. Elimination of special privileges (perks) and "gifts" for all
members of Congress. For example, members would be required to get
their health care just as any member of the public or the most
humble government employee gets theirs. Also, no special clubs or
spas for members, no cut-rate dining rooms, etc.
10. Federal regulation of funding for public education that would
insure equitable distribution of funds nationwide based solely on
student enrollment.
11. A loop-hole free, hard-nosed and effective campaign finance law.
This might require that the Supreme Court overturn its previous free
speech ruling ("the Supreme Court's constitutional equation of money
with "speech" - the logic that's warped our campaign finance rules
since the famous 1976 case of Buckley vs. Valeo": Mathew Miller), or
that congress enact an imaginative law to circumvent its noxious
effects.
12. Opportunity for the public to decide directly, perhaps every
seven or twelve years, whether or not they would like to convene a
constitutional convention for the purpose of revising or amending
the constitution. The question might be placed simultaneously on the
ballots of each of the states and might require approval by two
thirds majority of the national electorate (not the states) to
carry.
Sanford M. RussellPosted by mirmir on 2006-01-25 07:14:38

Most of us profess to believe in representative government - a
democratic republic - as the founders did and as the Constitution
provides. Some of us have the same fear that most or perhaps all of
them (including Madison) had for populist government or direct
democracy, with good reason. Anyone who is familiar with the
California initiative/referendum/recall abomination would probably
share this view. History provides ample warning against direct
democracy and its role in the collapse of republics, while the great
Montesquieu expressly denounced it. We might quibble with
Montesquieu but we ought not to cavalierly ignore history.
The USA has again embraced a tar baby, this time in Iraq, with no
honorable means of disengagement in sight. Any response needs to
concentrate on long term solutions that might prevent future
administrations from following similar destructive schemes. I see a
reform of the political system as absolutely essential -
particularly a reform directed toward securing better qualified,
better informed and more honorable people to serve in appointive and
elective office - people who would be more likely to place the long
term good of the people foremost. Is it too optimistic to think that
a political party or "think tank" might seriously consider promoting
substantive reform? It calls for imaginative, audacious leadership -
a lamentable scarcity.
I mention "long term solutions," "fundamental change," and the
Founding because I think that they are important - vitally
important. Anyone engaged in political action would do well to have
a solid foundation in America's early history, particularly the
fascinating saga of the struggle for the Constitution. As Bernard
Bailyn reminds us: "We must get the two-hundred-year-old story
straight, in some way, in order to make sense of our own world."
Even Carl Rove has read (and badly misinterpreted) bits of Madison.
None of the founders, certainly not Madison, thought of the
Constitution as a sacred document. It aches for a few fundamental
changes - and soon.
Here, then are some of my suggestions for change, by no means
exhaustive. Most of them would require a change to the doddering,
old, justly venerated, Constitution:Posted by mirmir on 2006-01-25 07:12:57

OK, here are a few samples from the 3000 or so messages on the site that I moderate. These are my comments (not quotes) that were part of an exchange with Lsmith. IPosted by mirmir on 2006-01-25 07:11:17

It's difficult to dialogue with people who are uninformed, who won't read and likely don't listen. I believe that I had a lot to say about "it" (see my posting of Jan. 18, 19, 20, 21 and 22). Ignore any "quotes from others" and stick to my comments. And then read the responses, see if they indicate a desire to dialogue. If you want more of what I "say about it" (what is 'it' anyway?), go to this site as I suggested in my post of Jan. 22, particularly my interactions. There you'll find a lot of quotes as well, but skip them if you want and read only my original comments:
Shortly after 9/11 I began to look for ways to Posted by mirmir on 2006-01-25 06:48:47

Ahhh. Who doesn't have the government they deserve? You have given quotes from others, mirmir. What do you say about it? I'm more interested in dialogue than refutation, though I see how it may not appear that way.Posted by wileywitch on 2006-01-24 13:55:47

Well, I tried to re-direct this discussion to "war drums" but not a single response to my post. Here it is again, with a couple of additions.
Concern that the U.S. might be launching an illegal aggression
against Iran is justified. The URL below will take you to an article
on Iran, and I heartily recommend the Atlantic Monthly's recent two
articles on A.Q.Khan if you haven't already read them.
Pakistani supporters of Bin Laden may very well take over control of
Pakistan's government giving them not only the bomb ready-built but
the means to deliver it.
We'll not get back to any of the treaties (nuclear proliferation,
Kyoto, etc.) so long as the "American" public remains dumb and
apathetic. Only determined action on the part of U.S. voters can
prevent or stall the administration's (and I include future
administrations) "eternal wars." There's little that we can hope for
there, as a glance at today's home page of "The Washington Post"
would indicate.
Who's ultimately responsible for the corruption in Congress (and
government in general)? Who put Bush and cronies in office? Not just
those who voted for the suckers, but all those who didn't vote as
well as those who smugly think that (blindly?) voting once a year
completes their civic duty.
Yes, the old saw is correct. We have precisely the government we
deserve and the entire country, each one of us, is responsible for
U.S. aggression.
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Front_Page.html
SPEAKING FREELY
What the Iran `nuclear issue' is really about
It suits both the US and Iran for the issue to be seen to be the
Iranian nuclear "threat". In fact that "issue" is a proxy for Iraq,
where Iran is meddling in what is and has been for many years the
US's number-one obsession: energy security. - Chris Cook
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Front_Page.html
Pakistan in a spot over Iran nuke secrets
By attacking a suspected militant hideout in Pakistan, the US has shown it will take matters into its own hands, no matter how much political harm this might do to President General Pervez Musharraf. The general has a bargaining chip, though: nuclear scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan, to whom the US would dearly like to speak in connection with Iran's alleged nuclear weapons program. - Syed Saleem Shahzad
The Iran-Israel misconception
There is an erroneous belief, especially in the US, that Tehran's road to peacefully engaging Washington travels through Jerusalem. Such misperceptions sow the seeds of conflict. - Kaveh L AfrasiabiPosted by mirmir on 2006-01-24 06:20:23

Oh mirmir, you're taking it all too seriously. Poetry isn't going to stop wars, or starvation, or unemployment. It's not going to open the mind of anyone who didn't want to open their mind already. It's not going to teach the illiterate how to read. It won't treat radiation poisoning. It won't prevent cholera.
You can't eat it. It won't stop a bullet. It won't keep you warm. It won't make our leaders tell the truth. It won't keep industry from poisoning our planet. Hell, it won't even put food on the table.
I'm not saying that I don't sit down with Rich and Rilke now and then, or that I don't love hearing poetry in foreign languages. I do hate rhyming poetry and I recognize it as my limitation, but so what?
It's a luxury for the intellect. If we cannot speak precisely for the concrete and be understood, and vice versa, then what good is poetry? The war drums are beating again.Posted by wileywitch on 2006-01-23 13:12:08

"God, I hate rhyming poetry.
The only thing more futile than writing poetry is translating it."
There, you see Fitzgerald? Utterly futile. And translations of the good Omar into more than 40 languages? Someone should have told them. And what could you have been thinking of, Edward - rhyme?
"Ah, fill the cup: -- what boots it to repeat
How Time is slipping underneath out Feet:
Unborn To-morrow, and dead Yesterday,
Why fret about them if To-day be sweet!"
How hateful. And the poor man didn't know when to stop, he just went on and on rhyming, translating, composing. He must have been insane. Nonsense, surely. What we need more than anything is edification.
And how awful to have literature cluttered up with all those futile translations of Ghalib, Mohammad Taqi Mir, Nazir...
"It's at such gatherings
That lives are lost,
For Beauty does not spare
And love does not
Know economy."
You see Ahmed Ali, sahib, you should have saved yourself the trouble. Nobody wants to read Mir in translation - it's futile. And all Mr. Merwin's followers, leave off!
God, how I hate quatrains!Posted by mirmir on 2006-01-23 07:19:17

Ezra Pound and T. S. Eliot
Are fighting in the captain's tower
While calypso singers laugh at them
And fishermen throw flowers
Between the windows of the sea
Where lovely mermaids flow
And nobody has to think too much
About Desolation Row
Zimmy
QUPosted by luminous beauty on 2006-01-22 18:48:07

pumpernickel shoes
I think that I will never see
suspenders on a bumble bee,
a chatty at a word for loss,
or onion flavored dental floss.
God, I hate rhyming poetry.
The only thing more futile than writing poetry is translating it.Posted by wileywitch on 2006-01-22 17:34:42

"QUPosted by mirmir on 2006-01-22 13:13:42

mirmir, is it too much of a stretch to think of this as the informing part?Posted by wileywitch on 2006-01-22 13:13:04

These paragraphs are from Bud Parr:
Posted by mirmir on 2006-01-22 13:01:57

I'm not criticizing your tastes, mirmir. I'm criticizing your critique.
You don't have to like Neruda, but saying his poetry is bad is just nonsense. Saying he's a bad man because he wrote an elegy to Stalin is just politics. You want to read some bad political poetry, try Keats. Really awful, even though I mostly agree with him. But Keats did write some immortal shit.
I personally don't care for Llosa's political and social views, but he is still an excellent writer. The same for Wolfe and McMurtry. On the other hand I think one of the most endearingly poetic writers in Latin America I've read is Galeano, a mere journalist.
I liked your bits at Chowk. Very simple, almost minimalist. They give your poem above some context so I can see it a little better. I think the sailing one is the best of the lot. The last lines really make it pop. The weaving one is evocative, but it doesn't really go anywhere, does it? Maybe that was your intention. A lament on the mind's complexity? Very Elliot-like.Posted by luminous beauty on 2006-01-22 10:16:55

Taste governs our preference in poetry as it does in all art forms. Your choices are valid for you, just as mine are valid for me. It isnPosted by mirmir on 2006-01-22 07:53:02

Mirmir, do you not agree that the U.S. should mind the nuclear log in it's own eye before attempting to remove the capability from other nations?Posted by wileywitch on 2006-01-21 16:24:51

...the trees planetarium...--- I love it! I love deciduous trees, and especially fruit and nut trees, in all their seasons. This line actually conjured some of my favorite views of pecan trees in the south at night, when all is left is husks that are shaped like stars. Their silhouettes against the night sky are fabulous.
To the lemon! To love! To the love of lemons!
Prost!Posted by wileywitch on 2006-01-21 16:23:06

mirmir, given so many opaque abstractions, a little concrete clarity might be useful. A spash of cold water, a slap in the face, a poke in the eye?
I thought the metaphors in the Lemon fit together quite snugly. Certainly nothing even similar to 'lots of unrelated metaphors endlessly and senselessly strung one after another, the poetPosted by luminous beauty on 2006-01-21 15:56:12

By the way, the Neruda poem that you posted contains many of the irritating shortcomings that Swartz does justifiably criticize - lots of unrelated metaphors endlessly and senselessly strung one after another, the poet's meaning lost or absent. Here's another Neruda gem:
'To be men! That is the Stalinist law! . . .
We must learn from Stalin
his sincere intensity
his concrete clarity. . . .
Stalin is the noon,
the maturity of man and the peoples.
Stalinists, Let us bear this title with pride. . . .
Stalinist workers, clerks, women take care of this day!
The light has not vanished.
The fire has not disappeared,
There is only the growth of
Light, bread, fire and hope
In Stalin's invincible time! . . .
In recent years the dove,
Peace, the wandering persecuted rose,
Found herself on his shoulders
And Stalin, the giant,
Carried her at the heights of his forehead. . . .
A wave beats against the stones of the shore.
But Malenkov will continue his work.'
"This poem remains in print in Neruda's Spanish-language collected writings. It does not often appear in anthologies of his work in English."
Ah ha. Now we're getting truly edified. "...the growth of light, bread, fire and hope..." Indeed, Pablo, whatever the devil that sordid rubbish means. Stalin growing bread? And just how clear is concrete? Crystal, yes, but... Hmmm. Learn from Stalin, certainly, but not by any stretch in the way that Neruda meant it. Can anyone bear to read this nonsense twice? Bad man, bad men.Posted by mirmir on 2006-01-21 14:17:46

Nope, not a science fiction fan. Nevil Shute's "On the Beach," not exactly science fiction, is about as close as I get.
GarcPosted by mirmir on 2006-01-21 13:26:34

wiley,
I want you to know this little comment did not go by unnoticed and unappreciated:
"Though anyone who has tried knows that it isnPosted by luminous beauty on 2006-01-21 10:04:54

Perhaps, mirmir, it would be useful if we all could imagine that we were each personally capable of willfully inflicting massive destruction on the world.
Do you read Science Fiction? Have you ever read Alfred Bester's The Stars My Destination ?
Given your linguistic inclinations I suspect you are a possible fan of Borges. I love Borges. Given your dislike of Neruda and Tagore is it safe to assume you are equally unresponsive to the literary charms of Marquez, Allende, Esquivel, Fuentes, et al? How about Pynchon?
That particular critique of Neruda you alluded to is one of the most dispicable and disengenuous ever written. You should research it a little, perhaps? (I've put off responding with you on this issue because it makes me angry enough to spit fire and eat iron.)
Yes, your little poem does have a Neruda-esque dimension but lacking Neruda's deep human warmth that your description would have one wish for it.
An example for your edification:

Ode To a Lemon
Out of lemon flowers
loosed
on the moonlight, love's
lashed and insatiable
essences,
sodden with fragrance,
the lemon tree's yellow
emerges,
the lemons
move down
from the tree's planetarium
Delicate merchandise!
The harbors are big with it-
bazaars
for the light and the
barbarous gold.
We open
the halves
of a miracle,
and a clotting of acids
brims
into the starry
divisions:
creation's
original juices,
irreducible, changeless,
alive:
so the freshness lives on
in a lemon,
in the sweet-smelling house of the rind,
the proportions, arcane and acerb.
Cutting the lemon
the knife
leaves a little cathedral:
alcoves unguessed by the eye
that open acidulous glass
to the light; topazes
riding the droplets,
altars,
aromatic facades.
So, while the hand
holds the cut of the lemon,
half a world
on a trencher,
the gold of the universe
wells
to your touch:
a cup yellow
with miracles,
a breast and a nipple
perfuming the earth;
a flashing made fruitage,
the diminutive fire of a planet.
Pablo Neruda

Not bad for a bad man and a bad poet, eh?Posted by luminous beauty on 2006-01-21 09:58:21

This illustrates what I meant by my comment a few posting ago "language is important, communication is difficult." I didn't name any specific country that BL's supporters might target. Pakistani rockets have limited range, they certainly aren't capable of reaching the U.S. I've no doubt, though, that anti-western fanatics could find "suitable" targets within reach - targets that might provoke an atomic response from the U.S. - and then??? Given access to Pakistan's atomic facilities I suppose technicians could rather easily assemble "suitcase" bombs capable of reaching anyone, anywhere. . .a place right next door.
I agree with those who say that the U.S. is the world's aggressor, maybe even the world's leading terrorist. Even so, I'd hate to see every nation in the world armed with atomic weapons simply to satisfy someone's morbid idea of equity. That seems to be where we are headed, though. Somehow, before it's too late, we have to put decent people in Washington who understand diplomacy, who are willing to negotiate and who are capable of doing so. It depends on the American public, on you and I (and everyone else) and our commitment to action. I'm not optimistic. Apathy is king, visionary leaders absent.
Now, this has become a dialogue between only two of us. Surely there's a more populous place to carry on this discussion.Posted by mirmir on 2006-01-21 08:25:32

Just out of curiosity, mirmir---what makes you think that bin Laden's supporters in Pakistan would use a nuclear weapon against us?
How would that benefit them?Posted by wileywitch on 2006-01-20 15:05:47

Certainly your concern that the U.S. might be launching an illegal aggression against Iran is justified. The URL below will take you to an article on Iran, and again I heartily recommend the Atlantic Monthly's two articles on A.Q.Khan. Pakistani supporters of Bin Laden may very well take over control of Pakistan's government giving them not only the bomb ready-built but the means to deliver it.
We'll not get back to the treaties so long as the "American" public remains dumb and apathetic. Only determined action on the part of U.S. voters can prevent or stall the administration's (and I include future administrations) "eternal wars." There's little to hope for there, as a glance at today's home page of "In These Times" would indicate.
Who's ultimately responsible for the corruption in Congress (and government in general)? Who put Bush and cronies in office? Not just those who voted for the suckers, but all those who didn't vote as well as those who smugly think that (blindly?) voting once a year completes their civic duty.
Yes, the old saw is correct. We have precisely the government we deserve and the entire country, each one of us, is responsible for U.S. aggression.
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Front_Page.html
SPEAKING FREELY
What the Iran 'nuclear issue' is really about
It suits both the US and Iran for the issue to be seen to be the Iranian nuclear "threat". In fact that "issue" is a proxy for Iraq, where Iran is meddling in what is and has been for many years the US's number-one obsession: energy security. - Chris CookPosted by mirmir on 2006-01-20 06:34:27

Mirmir, my concern is that we are launching an illegal aggression against Iran. They aren't in violation of anything, and if they were, it wouldn't be grounds for a preventive attack, which is illegal anyway.
We have more nuclear weapons than God. That Pakistan or North Korea has a handful of warheads, doesn't worry me. We started the MAD doctrine, why do we throw fits when countries that we targeted and branded evil, make nuclear weapons to deter an attack? It apparently works.
Furthermore, Iran doesn't have a nuclear weapons program---they're ready to gear up a nuclear power plant. They are signatories to the NPT and are well within their rights to start a nuclear power plant.
For me, getting back with the treaties and not escaliting the nuclear arms race is second only to not attacking countries and not committing genocide.Posted by wileywitch on 2006-01-19 11:59:42

wileywitch...
Before discussing Iran maybe we ought to clean house right here in the good old U.S.A. Enough talking, we've got to act, and term limits for Congress ranks at the top of the "to do" list. Next comes a return to an essentially exemption-free draft.
Back to Iran. Have you read William Langewiesche's two recent articles in the Atlantic Monthly on A.Q.Khan? Interesting background on the Iran-Pakistan connection. Strange bedfellows indeed.
Pakistan, for me, is the really big concern.Posted by mirmir on 2006-01-19 08:09:33

I'm just waiting for the world to blow up, and I'm lazy.
In a previous life, I lost, in the final round of a poetry slam, to a guy who did a haiku about "stump training" (which, I believe is having sex with a cow). I never kid myself about a world waiting for my poetry. I rarely read poetry myself. It takes more energy than it's worth to me.
Hey mirmir, there are crowds on other posts. We have primarily sustained this thread by talking beyond the article. Happens all the time. It works. Can anyone get a conversation going about Iran on any related threads?
There's a challenge.Posted by wileywitch on 2006-01-18 18:36:29

Good stuff, wileywitch! It looks, though, that you need to find a wider audience - there're only three of us here, as far as I can tell.Posted by mirmir on 2006-01-18 15:31:00

Whoosh!Posted by luminous beauty on 2006-01-18 14:34:03

My best friend who knows me better than anyone ever has, has no idea what my poems are about.
This one is about trying to come to grips with the prospect of nuclear annihilation. I sense Lumens will recognize the title.
...and so on...
With the last human sacrifice, memory fails.
Could not at least the sun remain?
Myth and rhythm breathe in the turbulence---
fire and rock,
the etching of planets,
lumbering worlds,
stars----
they sputter and die as we speak.Posted by wileywitch on 2006-01-18 13:15:50

Nope.Posted by wileywitch on 2006-01-18 13:10:20

Do I have a poem about character?Posted by wileywitch on 2006-01-18 13:09:36

wileywitch...
Sure, do post it. I don't think it's daft at all and your muse will thank you, may even get a little fiesty.
luminous...
All that you say rings true. Philosophology - I'm going to adopt that word. ThanksPosted by mirmir on 2006-01-18 12:36:06

I should add that genius is like lightning. It seldom strikes anyone more than once.Posted by luminous beauty on 2006-01-18 12:16:56

Au contraire, mon ami mirmir,
Genius always cuts straight to the meat of the nut. That's what genius does. Whatever the field; Poetry, Art, Philosophy, or Basketball. It's just those of us with only above average intelligence who pride ourselves how our minds are cluttered with minutiae and complexity, and gleefully distracted by nuance and innuendo.
What you're saying about 'academic' philosophy, I quite understand. Persig has a good word for it. He calls it Philosophology.
Come on now, wiley. Don't tease us! Treat us to a song.Posted by luminous beauty on 2006-01-18 12:03:42

Ashes to ashes, mirmir?
You may think this is the most daft thing you've ever heard, but I've been thinking of posting my poetry and fatuous lyricism on my website with some explanation.
The closest thing we Americans have to a common language is television and movies.Posted by wileywitch on 2006-01-18 10:51:05

wileywitch...
Well, Michael retired, let's see, how many times? So here I am again.
We do fret and fuss over simple stuff, but rare times genius cuts straight through to the hard kernel. Conrad did that in his "Heart of Darkness" while the very best poets often do. You and luminous gave us examples.
Back to philosophy, here's a short poem of mine on the subject, subtitled "bi-directionalism" or "how my mother survived a near fatal bout with reasoning:"
1 and 2 and ...
Determined I will
count from zero
all the way
and back again
I set out boldly
then start back
perplexed
cannot begin
to reach the end
of counting endlessly
but am
my count undone
where I will be
where I was then
when numbers never were.Posted by mirmir on 2006-01-18 06:29:53

Claro, Hifi.Posted by luminous beauty on 2006-01-17 19:58:27

there's a Seussville University!
This is so cool. I feel all yahoo-ey like Kermit. Anyone with little kids should check this out.
Maybe I was thinking of the Lorax tree. Not to be quite so glib as the "everything I needed to know, I learned in kindergarten" spiel*, but there is still a place for storytelling as part of a shared language of values. Much of what we spin our wheels over is pretty simple stuff. Though anyone who has tried knows that it isn't that easy to lead a simple life.
*Did they teach this guy how to dismantle nuclear warheads in kindergarten? Did they tell him about permanent organic pollutants? (Huh?! I'll fight with anybody.)Posted by wileywitch on 2006-01-17 19:50:31

Hifi. I'm struggling with the who is "we" question. There are so many different cultures. Unfortunately, the marketing memes are transmitted more easily, and completely, and unconsciously than most others. "We" can always think of something else we "need".
I think there's a Dr. Seuss story to that effect.Posted by wileywitch on 2006-01-17 19:38:57

Mirmir, please look through the other threads. The threads here are long. We wander around. It's good. Ignorance is no problem---who isn't ignorant?
Hang out. Relax. The water's fine, once you get used to it.Posted by wileywitch on 2006-01-17 19:31:27

luminous beauty...
Well, not my last posting - this is.
The poem you posted, as you correctly noted, and as I wrongly supposed, wasn't by Neruda but by Octavio Paz. Once again, I've publicly exposed my naked ignorance. In my defense, if such there be, I`ve never read Ocavio Paz in translation, and I'm far from having read all his poems. Thank you for posting this one, and for the fine Dhammapada quote.Posted by mirmir on 2006-01-17 19:21:23

Luminous,
Nice use of the language, dense but clear.
If you take a closer look at what I wrote, you'll see that my position is that post-modernism (secularism, relativism, humanism) is not qualitatively, but categorically "superior" to indigenous worldviews which, in fact, do compete on quality ("My god is bigger than your god") and which are it's logical sub-categories.
It is similar to the way in which the study of language (anthropology, neurology, comparative linguistics...) is of a category that transcends the individual languages - with their claims of quality - and which are its sub-categorical subject matter. The goal is to understand the structure and mechanisms - within and without - and the interactions where they interface with one another in order to reconcile the apparent contradictions. The results have always, so far, to shown how we are all the same beneath superficial differences.
It's also what America has always been about, a great melting pot that progressively consumes different cultures and spits out a home for all. There has always been recidivism, with claims, now and then, of superior quality rising from an old tradition that is going under. Each time, it has been succeeded by an even more progressive society (anyone remember racial intolerance, discrimination against women, destitute seniors, neglect of the handicapped, child-labor, slavery?) So, I'm really not too worried. Besides character education having been proven to be impotent at achieving its own goals (it is worthless at doing what it claims to be able to do), what's more interesting is that it represents just another last gasp.Posted by Hifi on 2006-01-17 19:09:13

luminous beauty:
I quote Wittgenstein because he seemed to think philosophy mostly nonsense and that philosophers ought to confine themselves to the logic of language. That appeals to me. Of course Wittgenstein contradicts himself as he continued to concoct largely unintelligible philosophical tracts. I sincerely think he was putting us on, though, and that appeals to me, too. (My university compelled me to swallow a little philosophy, otherwise no degree, so I have read a little - very little.)
Now, please don't think that I'm just being contrary, but I don't like Neruda. One critic called him "a bad poet and a bad man" - pretty near the mark in my opinion. Shallow for the most part. The poem that you posted (yes, we are all mortal - it's all we have) might be the best thing he ever wrote and it's spot on for this discussion, although I have to confess he turned me off early on and I never got around to reading his entire work. He reminds me of Rabindranath, a poet Neruda admired and sometimes emulated but another poet I consider not much shakes. A funny thing, though, a life-long friend told me that my poems reminded him of Neruda. What can you do?
Wileywitch:
Is this the one? Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance
Author: Robert M. Pirsig
Yes, dead poets but not always dead poems.
OK, I've strayed far from the topic. This is my last posting, promise.Posted by mirmir on 2006-01-17 19:02:28

Zing. Takes the top of the head off (like Emily said).Posted by wileywitch on 2006-01-17 19:00:09

The moment now sings
how the future rushes past
and the past leads here.Posted by luminous beauty on 2006-01-17 18:48:18

....words cannot do everything. Chalk it on the walls where dead poets lie in their mausoleums.Posted by wileywitch on 2006-01-17 18:19:52

You said a mouthful for Wilbur, Lumens. I was trying earlier to find a kernel from Jaspers expressing somewhat the concept that philosophy was about being authentically, not defining it.
Ages ago, I ran into a website in which the author was developing a holistic mathematics to express phenomenon in a language that could be shared with all disciplines---an interdisciplinary language. The ways that knowledge is divided for study has grown klunky.
Who wrote Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance? Been thinking about that to---that we are all on the very front of the train---everyone always has been. Everyone who ever lived was a "contemporary". There is something about that razor's edge of being in which we decide what we will carry forward, if we decide.
Character is the topic, huh? My favorite poet is Adrienne Rich--- ....words cannot do everything. Chalk it on the walls where dead poets lie in their mausoleums.Posted by wileywitch on 2006-01-17 18:18:34

Paz, eh mirmir. Mas bien!

Posted by luminous beauty on 2006-01-17 17:48:54

mirmir,
There seems to be some cognitive discontinuity rattling around my brainpan after reading that you shun philosophy and follow by quoting Wittgenstein. Wittgenstein f'r crissakes! I confess that I don't understand philosophy. I think philosophy is something one does in the faint hope of improving one's understanding a little bit, but mostly for probing the edges of one's ignorance.
I'll let you have your Kantian quote. The equivalent to me is Ashley Brilliant, "I'm done with seeking Truth, what I'm looking for now is a good fantasy." As far as personal moral principle (differing from injunctive cultural rule) I have for a long time embraced this verse from the Dhammapada:
In the history of the world, violence has never put an end to violence. Only non-violence can put an end to violence. This is an universal principle.
I think there are basic philosophical questions that both transcend and encompass the secular/religious dichotomy that perplexes our present culture and society. Things like, "Why are we born to suffer and die?", "What is the true nature of consciousness?" and "Where can I find a decent Sushi Bar around here?"
Hifi,
Have you any familiarity with the works of Ken Wilbur? His contention is that the post-modern secular multi-cultural viewpoint won't be able to make any headway with those who are stuck in the mytho-magical agrarian tribalist viewpoint of religious fundamentalism or the rational -heirarchial and technological nationalism of establishmentarian political forces until we can overcome the narcissistic trap of believing in the qualitative superiority of our presumptively more evolved cognitive understanding. We have to learn to recognize that we carry all those previous levels of personal and cultural development ineluctably imbedded within us, as certainly as the healthy function of the cerebral cortex is dependent on a healthily functioning medulla oblongata. Though their survival value may be diminished they are still there.Posted by luminous beauty on 2006-01-17 17:11:53

Sometimes NOT to violate the speed limit would be reprehensible. I expect reasonable people to understand this. Just as I expect reasonable people to understand the intent and deeper meaning of the golden rule. To me, citing exceptions to it smacks of adolescent prancing. Philosophy doesn't generally rate much higher in my book.
In all cases language falls short. What we say or write seldom (or never?) expresses precisely what we intend, and how difficult it is to get people to understand us even when we somehow miraculously approach our intention. Communication is a good deal more than just language, or Webster's words carefully parsed. Blunt it may be, but beautiful, delightful, exquisite, rousing, too.
I'm an occasional poet. One of my "gurus" was (well, still is although we mourn his death) the great poet, humanitarian and unintentional philosopher Octavio Paz. To read him, whether in prose or poetry, is to commune with him. He understood how to use language as no other I've known.
I do not believe that I see people as actors, although I have sometimes acted on their behalf. And, no, I'm not familiar with Foucault, one of the many gaps in my ongoing education.Posted by mirmir on 2006-01-17 17:02:50

Language is a blunt instrument, but it doesn't have to be so blunt that we confuse our abstract analysis with our being.
I like the maxim---give yourself completely to the moment. It doesn't mean to ignore the past. We can't be fully in the present while ignoring all the signals from the past.
You seem to see people as actors with no inner drive, in a play of abstract cultural imperatives. Are you familiar with Foucault, mirmir?Posted by wileywitch on 2006-01-17 16:08:19

No, I'm not alluding to anything. And I am neither competent to defend nor to criticize Kant. I believe I made it clear that I shun philosophy and that I don't understand it. This fault, if it is a fault, has as much to do with the way philosophers write as it does with my inability to understand it. I fall back on Wittgenstein - the essence of philosophy is or ought to be the study of language.
"Wittgenstein's aim seems to have been to show up as nonsense the things that philosophers (himself included) are tempted to say. Philosophical theories, he suggests, are attempts to answer questions that are not really questions at all (they are nonsense), or to solve problems that are not really problems. He says in proposition 4.003 that:
Most of the propositions and questions of philosophers arise from our failure to understand the logic of our language. (They belong to the same class as the question whether the good is more or less identical than the beautiful.) And it is not surprising that the deepest problems are in fact not problems at all." from Duncan J. Richter
I like Kant's statement that I quoted and quote again: Posted by mirmir on 2006-01-17 13:43:30

Example:
Q: "I think kids should abstain until marriage. Where do secularists stand on chastity?"
A: "It's not a matter of chastity. The importance of chastity, and even marriage for that matter, developed during the Agriculture Age*, because only at that time did it become important to insure legitimacy of heirs to pass on the property to. There used to be laws to persecute the unchaste, and there still are in societies that are primarily agricultural. But since America industrialized, we don't have chastity laws anymore because the original reason for it no longer exists.
In other words, the old morals no longer apply because the old conditions have changed. I think, most of the time, secularists are going to find themselves up against moral rules that regress back to America's agricultural past - the time when current religions blossomed here. But we can always win against the attempt to reframe moral issues as rules for an agricultural society. That is because, ultimately, no one is going to insist that they wish to return to a life of farming.
Just as with liberals and taxes, the discussion about on what basis to manage human behavior has, so far, been framed so thoroughly by social conservatives, throughout society, that even those who don't agree still feel compelled to show that they too are champions of what, fundamentally, undermines their own objectives (e.g., morality and tax-cuts).
--
Morality - The relation of conformity or nonconformity to the moral standard or rule.
*In 1920, more than 30 percent of the mid-Western population lived on farms. In forty years -- by 1960 -- the percentage dropped to 7.5 percent. By 1990, that percentage shrank to 1.6 percent and, in the last ten years or so, has fallen below 1 percent. Simply put, in 1920 we viewed ourselves as largely rural people. More than 30 percent of us actually lived on farms; another significant percentage of us lived in small towns. Tracking the parallel rise of fundamentalism over this same period is telling.Posted by Hifi on 2006-01-17 12:50:06

But if the instinct to internalize a mythological symbolic system is as basic in humans as it is with language, can it be rationalized for the modern world? Yes, as a meta-model of belief, one that subsumes the various types of religions. The religions, then, become sub-categories of secular philosophy; they are not its co-categories. In the realm of language, the meta-model is accomplished as comparative linguistics, practically applied in translation, and popularly experienced as travel and school language requirements. People no longer widely believe that there is something of the thing that resides in the word for it. We have realized that naming is anchored to the logical, but arbitrary structure of the language being used. Linguistic relativity is not a kind of language, just as secularism is not a kind of religion
So, for a meta-model of belief systems, first and foremost, is providing cross-cultural exposure and education. That is how we've all come by our own relativist beliefs - one way or the other. Invite others to see how you live. Editorialize it. Let people make the comparison and allow the lesson about relativity to fall out of that. For, it is only relativism that gives the lie to absolutism.
But are secularists moral relativists, then? Yes [shudder!]. And framed that way, it is a losing proposition for us. In the political arena we mustn't compete as moralists of any stripe. Every religious person intuitively understands that morality is an inseparable, reinforcing component of an all-encompassing mythology, and, moreover, is as meaningless without it as a buggy wheel is without a buggy - to coin a metaphor. Secularists can't be drawn into arguing whether or not our system has a sort of wheel on our buggy, too, because it doesn't. Moreover, it is inconsequential because if you stand back from the buggy, you see that all of the real issues are fundamentally about transportation, not wheels.
Secularists must refuse to be framed by the question of morality; instead, the discussion needs to be reframed as a matter of social values, but specific to the problem at hand. When questioned if a secularist can be moral, we must respond, "It is not a matter of morality... it is a matter of law, of civil rights, of social justice, of economic sensibility, of the common welfare, of reducing injury, of protecting property..." So on and so forth. Get back to the precipitating issue and talk about the body of law that applies, all the while reinforcing commonalities and mitigating contradictions at the interfaces.
Reframed this way, the resistance met will only be that compromise is a bitch, rather than that one's ideas are to be discounted out-of-hand because of lacking authority in a supernatural worldview,. That's where we want to get them to, because that is the modern rational and political process.Posted by Hifi on 2006-01-17 12:49:02

Ah, yes, community. The dictionary defines "morality" as conforming social behavior. Speaking as a cultural anthropologist, morality is the model for human interaction that is primarily calibrated for conformance to the requirements of the local economic mode. Its function as a force for group survival is to reinforce the status quo of self and social system in support of the economy - proscribing the roles, rights and responsibilities among members of the group. Usually it is accomplished by in-graining intolerance, xenophobia, and repression of individual freedom and expression accompanied by harsh consequences for deviation (i.e., deviant). A singular axiom is to treat one's own group with loving care, and exploit the bloody hell out of others.
The supernatural mythology of a culture specifies the templates for the construction of the various elements of social reality. Daily routine and deliberate, ritual practice and religio-civic law are what implement relevant instances of the templates. One of the functions of mythology is to provide a mental model of representative symbolism for storing and inculcating moral values (rules) in individuals. Though the morality tales of myth are only a small part of it, the supernatural framework of the mythology defines and integrates structures of kinship, work and personal identity across the entire culture.
The entities of the supernatural - its gods - neatly embody complex rules of behavior in readily accessible, comprehensible, personal and ancestral anthropomorphs. The god symbols provide an intimate assurance that the reward of compliance is personal welfare; whereas that of non-compliance is disintegration of the personality. It is instinctive in humans to internalize the symbols and structures of mythology, just as it is with the words, grammars and syntax of the available language.
Evolving from simpler economies with simpler gods, the monotheistic God of agricultural societies is a highly sophisticated mental construct. It functions as a single, unifying symbol for mentally manipulating and synchronizing the various parts of a widely distributed, complex system. The supernatural, replete with its gods, is an evolutionary tool in humans that exists for maintaining, in a pre-conscious, emotive and collective way, what has been proven, over generations, to work. Social morality emanates from and reinforces the particular cultural system it is embedded in.
Think of it like this, a relativist agricultural society, if it could have developed at all, wouldn't have had the internal integrity in any area of life to last more than a generation. The ability to internalize socially proscribed rules of behavior (morals) that have been crystallized in supernatural belief systems has been, like language, essential to the success of Homo sapiens.
That was then.
Now, post-agricultural age, in a much smaller world, we have discovered that language is arbitrary and relative to local needs. So, too, mythology. Worse, the inherent competitive imperative of the mythological, along with its morality, is self-defeating and destructive in a modern, global society - not up to the task of managing so many human interfaces in constant flux. But what is?
Rather, it is the Rule of Law, negotiating roles, rights and responsibilities among diverse local groups with competing local interests, while at the same time, expanding rather than circumscribing individual civil liberties and opportunities - in its millions of sub-paragraphs, deliberations and compromises - that can preserve peace and prosperity, today.Posted by Hifi on 2006-01-17 12:46:51

I've never quite understood how Kant could formulate his "Critique of Pure Reason" which is fundamental to the pursuit of scientific knowledge in that he says reality can not be understood from a priori principles but only by comparison with sensate evidence, and put forth a moral philosophy resting on maxims one must a priori believe to be universally true and sensate experience counts for naught. When one writes thousand page tomes I guess it is reasonable to assume even the most powerful minds might lose the thread of their thoughts. My own interpretation is that he makes the error of exclusive opposition of means and ends without realizing they are just two aspects of a unified causality in order to preserve the idea of absolute and acausal 'free will'.
The most prominent contradiction to Kant's deontological argument is the Ann Frank case. If a Gestapo agent asked if one knew the whereabouts of hiding Jews and one knew about Ann Frank one would, according to Kant, be duty bound to tell the truth and have no responsibility for the consequences.
Is this what you are alluding to mirmir? After you get through Kant, may I suggest Arthur Shopenhauer.Posted by luminous beauty on 2006-01-17 11:15:13

Very thoughtful posts. I'm surprised that no one mentioned Kant's categorical imperative. I generally shun philosophy (probably because I can't understand it) but for me Kant puts it very nicely. Here's a copy from wikipedia's encyclopedia and their URL if you want to read more on Kant's dictum (and there's lots more):
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Categorical_Imperative
The categorical imperative is the philosophical concept central to the moral philosophy of Immanuel Kant and to modern deontological ethics. He introduced the concept in his Groundwork of the Metaphysic of Morals. It is outlined here according to the arguments found in this work.
Kant defined an imperative as any proposition that declares a certain kind of action (or inaction) to be necessary. A hypothetical imperative would compel action under a particular circumstance: If I wish to satisfy my thirst, then I must drink this lemonade. A categorical imperative would denote an absolute, unconditional requirement that exerts its authority in all circumstances, and is both required and justified as an end in itself. It is best known in its first formulation:
"Act only according to that maxim by which you can at the same time will that it would become a universal law."Posted by mirmir on 2006-01-17 08:17:36

Wow, I'm stoked at the intelligent and interesting responses to my post!
I should remind that my list of 13 was a set of summarizations, paraphrasing a beer-laden conversation into the wee hours. When I was writing in preparation for the post, I tried to phrase it out as a set of tendencies of thought and action that might be observed in a person of "good character". Getting an unassailable definition of "good character" was beyond us, I suppose, and I can't remember us even trying to do so.
Actually, it was a pretty lively and fun discussion, which my list of 13 could never replicate.
In any case, without suggesting any level of true, cosmic objectivity, I phrased those out hoping to trigger a response and I find the ones offered to be smashing. Muchas gracias!
Hifi's recommendations were thought-provoking. I'm not sure people always act from the basis of practicality, in fact I think that much of human behavior is quite un-pragmatic in the sense that what people do and say so often ends up increasing their hassle quotient, delaying their improvement of life, or at the very least advancing ideology over concrete results, but we could debate the semantics of "practical" as much as debating the similarity/difference between being a person of character v. being a moral person.
Piggybacking off that, and certainly not to be critical because I enjoyed those posts after mine a lot, but I sometimes observe that debates about attributes of people degrade into discussions of semantics. Spending a lot of time debating what words mean. A bit of that is necessary, of course, but at some point it can get pretty tedious (I'm remembering events from my university years!). It's inevitable, I guess. The whole existence of a concept like semantics implies the lack of objective, universally acceptable definitions to abstract terms. Discussions like that can be stimulating, but they can also halt any progress toward understanding each other, because no one can agree to the meanings of the words they're using. They just keep hammering that the terms the other guys used were the wrong ones, or the right ones wrongly used, or that they didn't know the meanings of the words they were using...
...you get my drift, eh?
It was one of my major sources of impatience as I was getting finished with my formal education, and made me want to get out into the work world, away from all the blab.
Haha, so I got into schooling! Silly...
Not that there's any lack of semantics-juggling at work, I assure you. Surely not in schooling, where we change, recycle, and argue about jargon in ways that are as witheringly dull as they are incessant.
Anyway, I'll quit blathering. Thanks, enjoyed it.Posted by Kuya on 2006-01-17 01:02:59

Hello, Lumens. I think you're right on about the stages of development. There are neurological realities that make children children and not short adults. It's better not to throw the baby out with the bathwater---the fact that social engineering (Dewey and Freud. Yuck.) attempts to capitalize on these various stages of development doesn't mean that those stages are not real. One of my pet peeves about public school is the way that children are segregated by age so that they are expected to adapt to a somewhat arbitrary standard.Posted by wileywitch on 2006-01-16 20:56:36

Gatto is talking about qualities of an educated person which is admittedly culturally relative.
I agree with your point, and see much of the conflict in U.S. society as a reaction against leaps in knowledge and the ethical quandaries they present---nanotechnology, cloning, life on Mars(?), global warming, etc.
As you pointed out with the "Golden Rule" example, humans and human society are not simple.
Here's a question Hifi---How would you define "community"? It seems to me like a lot rigid thinking is a desperate attempt to feel secure in a world with few or no nets. You touched on this when you said,
...the social contract offers assurances of social safety and health, equal opportunity, and, the population and government are overwhelmingly not religious (e.g., moralizing seems to have an inverse effect on a nationPosted by wileywitch on 2006-01-16 20:42:59

Sorry about the repost here - too many grammatical errors in that last post.
My main point was that character is an un-measurable quantity of being. The term "character" has no substance or validity in psychology - so there is nothing there to either be measured as lacking in the first place or to be improved upon by something like CE. Therefore, the messy attempt is made, even by the most objective of us (Kuya), to couple character with behavioral indicators (good grades, obey authority, follow the rules, be nice). Or worse, as Gatto does, tries to attach character to purely imaginary, culturally relative, aesthetic ideals.
Put this way, it is pretty obvious how character and morality are the mythical constructs for defining the relative values of a specific culture and that the toolbox for indoctrination and internalization in the young and reinforcement in the old is religion (a.k.a. known as CE - because they both takes relative values to be absolutes).
Ironically for us, in previous times, the ability to internalize, in absolute terms, the rules and values of a culture - one bound to a specific environment and, therefore, economy - was a necessary survival trait. You wouldn't have found an agricultural or nomadic society that would have survived without the conformity, constraints on change, or lack of uniform resistance against outside aggressors that a strict religious/moral code enables. Even today, this defines the most dominant and aggressive cultures - or, for that matter, the individuals within it. Militant conservatism used to all but guarantee success to the strong and united. For hundreds of thousands of years, using our evolved capacity to use culture to adapt faster than physical evolution alone allows, has meant passing on what worked in the past as the best model for what works in the future - with incremental changes infrequently introduced by new, uppity young alpha males.
But there's the rub. The ability that evolved in us to internalize tradition in static and insulated societies (culture, language, economic and social rules) is a liability in a globalized humanity where our adaptability to change becomes more important than our devotion to tradition - our tribal integrity. Fortunately, we this same ability to learn and re-make ourselves, even in the somewhat hardened state of adulthood, allows us to modify/control/repress our more destructive instincts.
What has emerged is a new model for a socialized human, one predominately defined by the expression of meta-traits: multi-stage critical thinking, sensitivity to systems dynamics (small effects, large outcomes), assumption of relativism, recognition of individual variability, concerns for quality of life and requisite social justice, a liberal egalitarianism, creativity, innovation and experiment. This is the very definition of today's successful post-modern societies (and I'm not talking military dominance - to the contrary. The U.S.' own ascendancy as a military power, but also as an exporter of culture, is due to, more often than not, to providing a nurturing environment to this new human).
We are still in the midst of this transition as we witness the proponents of rationality growing ever more confidant, like Mr. Harris - especially in response to the desperation (i.e., intelligent design, values voting) which the very real threat to the end of entrenched power is provoking in its one-dimensional "characters". Pity.
http://members.cox.net/patriotismforall/character_ed_links.htmlPosted by Hifi on 2006-01-16 16:30:22

My main point was that character is an un-measurable quantity of being. The term "character" has no validity in psychology - so there is nothing there to either to be measured as lacking in the first place or for improvement by something like CE. So, the messy attempt is made, even by the most objective of us (Kaya) to couple character with behavioral indicators (good grades, obey authority, follow the rules, be nice) as indicators. Or worse, as Gatto does, attaches character to purely imaginary, culturally-relative aesthetic ideals.
Put this way, it is pretty obvious how character and morality are the mythical constructs for defining the relative values of a specific culture and that the toolbox for indoctrination and internalization in the young and reinforcement in the old is religion (a.ka. known as CE - because they both takes relative values to be absolutes).
Ironically for us, in previous times, the ability to internalize in absolute terms the rules and values of a culture, one bound to a specific environment and, therefore, economy, was a necessary survival trait. You wouldn't find an agricultural or nomadic society that would have survived without the conformity, constraints on change or lack of uniform resistance against outside aggressors that a strict religious/moral code enables. Even today, this defines the most dominant and aggressive cultures - or, for that matter, the individuals within it. Militant conservatism used to all but guarantee success to the strong and united. Over hundreds of thousands of years, using our evolved capacity to use culture to speed up adaptation meant passing on what worked in the past as the best model for what works in the future - with incremental changes infrequently introduced by new, uppity young alpha males.
But there's the rub. The ability that evolved in us to internalize tradition in static and insulated societies (culture, language, economic and social rules) is a liability in a globalized humanity where our adaptability to change becomes more important than and our retention of tradition - our tribal integrity. Fortunately, we retain this ability to re-make ourselves, even in the somewhat hardened state of adulthood that allows us to modify/control/repress our more destructive instincts.
The new model for a socialized human is defined by expressing meta-traits: multi-stage critical thinking, sensitivity to systems dynamics (small effects, large outcomes), assumption of relativism, recognition of individual variability, concerns for quality of life and requisite social justice, a liberal egalitarianism, creativity, innovation and experiment. This is the very definition of today's successful post-modern societies (and I'm not talking military dominance - to the contrary, the U.S.'s own ascendancy in this respect, but also as an exporter of culture is due to, more often than not, nurturing this new human.
America is still in the midst of this transition as we witness the proponents of rationality growing ever more confidant, especially in response to the desperation (i.e., intelligent design, values voting) that it is provoking in those who are feeling the very real threat to end of entrenched power with its one-dimensional "characters". Pity.
http://members.cox.net/patriotismforall/character_ed_links.htmlPosted by Hifi on 2006-01-16 16:12:03

Hifi,
A lot of good questions and ideas you present.
I don't think you are correct in calling Kuya's list a set of behavioral rules. If for no other reason they are written in the subjunctive mood rather than as injunctions. I think they are more a set of empirical markers of the kind of behaviors that an ethical person is more likely to exhibit, presented as discussion points rather than systematic and fixed parameters. They don't presume to prescribe any pedagogical method. Just a minor quibble.
Any set of developmental rules or principles or framework or whatever epistemological approach one may use to effect such development implies some hierarchical order that is externally instilled. The counterbalance of this tendency is to approach the child's ethical growth as the cultivation and natural unfoldment of innate potentiality.
America's first philosopher of education, Waldo Emerson, said that in a free society it is more important to teach children how to think rather than what to think. It seems this ideal has been sadly watered down by the 20th century's conventions of Dewey pragmatism and Freudian normalization.
I really think the best thinking is the Piaget/Kohlberg model of the development of moral reasoning, modified with Gilligan's intuitive relational approach to caring and empathy. The important thing about these ideas is that they delineate moral development according to successive stages. The hard fact is that children's capacity for moral reasoning has to pass through the conventional stage of rule-based socialization before they can begin to approach the autonomous self-actualizing post-conventional stage of development that we as progressives generally see as a desirable social good. It is usually only in post-adolescence that transcendent moral perspectives have the chance of manifesting themselves.
It therefore seems to me that it is more important to have teachers and administrators who have attained a certain empirical level of stage three growth to guide kids as they learn to behave within the rules whatever society they actually live in (home, school, the street) imposes and prepare them for the greater social world they will later hopefully engage. That implies an administrative structure more in alignment with supporting the individual judgment of teachers and less concerned with imposing curricular standards. It also implies the need for continuing moral and ethical education beyond secondary school.
I think the central problem with conservative character building programs like the one under discussion is they are in reactionary opposition to the anti-authoritarian implications of extended adult moral development. The doctrine of original sin that says people are fated to degenerate without externally imposed moral rules. They seek to keep us all at an adolescent level of subservience.Posted by luminous beauty on 2006-01-16 10:16:46

Almost done.
The real question underlying all this is not the good or bad character of students; it is about on what basis one should act. I would argue that making appropriate choices requires very little in the way of any specific character enhancements in children - who are all just fine thank you. Equally inert is the attempt to indoctrinate impossible to define behavioral axioms (i.e., "Use self-control."). Appropriate choices require no more and no less than well-informed critical thinking with an eye to long-range consequences.
Rather than spend time and money investing in fixing children (e.g., character education) let's offer them real decision support by investing in academics (NOT the 3 R's) - but science, history, government.
Students are exposed to an unacceptable risk of getting it wrong when ideal behavior is presented in the form of unfounded, unreasoned rules and clichPosted by Hifi on 2006-01-16 02:00:19

There is a basic question in this line of thinking that is never addressed. Why do people behave as they do? Is it the person who has evil in him (bad character)? Note that it is hard to think outside this paradigm when embedded in a religiously saturated culture as we are. Not just from the church, for there is nary a movie plot, especially those requiring violent solutions by the good guys without a villain who is pure evil (or had an unusually abusive childhood). But 99.9% of real criminals and enemies are just regular folks like you and me. Just people living. Would following rules change us? How much? The assumption is unproven and regularly contradicted. In fact, it can be better argued that it is conditions that produce the most profound changes. Because we are pragmatic, highly adaptable and highly socially-structured beings Posted by Hifi on 2006-01-16 01:58:58

Kuya, yours is a list of moral rules, not character attributes - a line that character education consistently blurs. For example, does "Truthfulness in speech and honesty in business and personal interactions" mean one is trustworthy or honest? What frequency qualifies? Are there other qualifiers? What are the disqualifiers? Are they absolute or cumulative, an average? Etc, etc.
As such, I am as immediately skeptical of any lists of moral rules (i.e., rules for behavior) as a list of ill-defined, un-measurable character traits. In fact, they are impossible and absurd because individuals make choices in the real world, where every context is different from the last. Rules (commandments), at best, are simplifications, easy-outs from needing to do the minute-by-minute hard work to arrive at a good reason for one's actions. In fact, instead trying to put forth a long list, how about we start with trying to find just one example of a moral that might qualify as universal.
The Golden Rule. About the only principle you can find which is trumpeted by all of the varieties of character education (CE), this widely acclaimed moral homily is a wonderful example of the problem of contextual vacancy with the CE industry.
First, consider if the *reasons* for following the Golden Rule in any given situation are actually valid? For instance:
* What if the other person doesn't also follow it?
* What if how you like things done to you is offensive in manner and result to others when done to them? (Ugly American syndrome is one example).
* What if more than one other is involved and their goals are in conflict?
* What if you both want things that will hurt you?
* Does following this principle lead to success, self-esteem, less abuse, less poverty, greater rights for all, a better environment?
* Which of the goals just listed does the Golden Rule achieve more effectively than alternatives: e.g., straight reciprocity (tit for tat); or the communist rule, "From each according to his ability, to each according to his need"; or plain old manipulation via marketing, selling, framing, half-truth and other widely regarded political and commercial means of manipulating others for one's own and even for their own "benefit"?
One more. "Don't kill" would seem to be a universal moral and not being a killer a universal character trait? WellPosted by Hifi on 2006-01-16 01:30:18

I see your points, though I like to stay a little more open where judgements are made. Like staying tentative---saying "yea" or "nay" so that I don't end up in the position of struggling over something because I said I would do it, though it is no longer the best action to take. So, I say "...perhaps, if..." a lot. In our society, that is often considered to be wishy-washy. I've found that I'm more effective when I don't waste a lot of time trying to be resolute for the sake of being resolute.
What I like about both lists is that we're never perfect. So there are always ways to grow and learn. I've especially found it rewarding to work on something that appeals to me when I'm psyched for some change. It seems simple now, but it took me a long time to learn that my time is better spent exercising my strengths and talents than harping on my weaknesses.
I would add that there are gifts---not everything has to be bought or earned. Give generously, and receive graciously---that's what I always say. If we didn't accept gifts, we could never give them.
Hope it doesn't sound like I'm lecturing or pontificating. Right now I am especially keyed to number nine on your list A recognition of the many benefits one has derived from the efforts and generosity of others...
It would be nice if we were in the habit of listening to our elders more. In a culture that doesn't respect the aged, character and wisdom don't appear to be worth the bother.Posted by wileywitch on 2006-01-13 22:12:33

Hello there wileywitch, that's a cool list. Can't say every one of the 20 applies perfectly well to me personally even if I think of myself as an educated (or at least semi-educated) man, but hey, it's always good to have something worth aspiring to, eh?
Maybe that's the prime ingredient of good character, the aspiration to be the best person one can be. Seems like when people say to themselves, "I'm cool enough, I'm smart enough, I'm all finished developing my character.", all of those qualities begin to erode in them immediately.
Some see these concerns has hopelessly "boyscout", I know. But considering some of the post-modern nihilistic alternatives, I'd rather be stuck with the boyscout tag.
Although, hahaha, since I'm cool with gay marriage and like to get a buzz on now and again, maybe the actual BSA wouldn't want me.
My daughter recently re-read Margaret Atwood's "A Handmaid's Tale", which led to her and I chatting about the sort of comparisons you mention between aggressive, dogmatic Christianity and its counterpart in Islam. For us it boiled down to a willingness to bully or hurt others on behalf of the religion. Same could apply to any ideology, secular or sectarian, naturally. As soon as I become willing to beat you up or harshly restrict you on behalf of my worldview, that's when it becomes possible for me to become beastly.
But don't worry, I may think of myself as a primate, but I don't tend to bite too often. ;-) Not quite THAT much of a beast... so farPosted by Kuya on 2006-01-13 21:18:13

Hey, Kuya. This is a list I hold close and dear. Gatto is my favorite educator.
John Taylor Gatto, former New York City and New York State Teacher of the Year has compiled the following list that he calls "The 20 Qualities of an Educated Person."
1. A broadly knowledgeable mind
2. Self confidence
3. A life purpose
4. A touch of class
5. Good leadership skills
6. The ability to work with a team
7. Patience
8. Good public speaking skills
9. Good writing skills
10. Resourcefulness
11. A desire for responsibility
12. Honesty
13. A public spirit
14. The ability to work well alone
15. An eye for details
16. The ability to focus at will
17. Perseverance
18. The ability to handle pressure
19. Curiosity
20. An attractive personal style
I see no discernible difference between the Taliban and the Christian right, other than the states of decay and degrees of poverty in our countries.Posted by wileywitch on 2006-01-13 19:18:38

Character education is a big issue in schooling (my field). I was talking with friends about how a conception of good character might be formulated that most anyone could respect, whether atheist or devout, in pretty much any cultural setting.
A tall order, I know.
A few things we came up with included the following:
1. Truthfulness in speech and honesty in business and personal interactions.
2. Regarding one's own stated commitments to be truly binding.
3. Unlikely to blame others for one's own screw ups, including a determination to do better next time and make amends right away.
4. Tending to listen carefully and without hasty evaluations, especially in the event of conflict.
5. Sincerely concerned about the effects of one's own decisions and behavior, most especially any possible negative effects upon others.
6. A basic attitude that in order to gain anything good in this life, that good thing ought to be earned.
7. A determination to deal with people as individuals, rather than overgeneralizing or broad-brushing.
8. A recognition of one's own limitations and a determination to improve as a person.
9. A recognition of the many benefits one has derived from the efforts and generosity of others, and a determination to be worthy of them.
10. Hesitance to identify others as true enemies, and if that becomes necessary keeping clear in one's mind exactly why such a drastic evaluation has had to be made.
11. A refusal to carry out actions that one would despise in another, regardless of rhetorical justifications and emotional reactions.
12. Readiness to assist others who are in need of help.
13. Readiness to forgive slights and offenses.
Keep in mind, several beers lubricated our conversation, so the stuff above is mainly my own summarizing paraphrases of things we said.
Much of this echoes the lessons of enlightened religion, although I don't see this as necessarily problematic. Certainly there's no implied pressure to take on beliefs that you don't have, or to conform to taboos that you consider meaningless (other than the taboos against harming or exploiting others). An atheist can still acknowledge the value of a teaching that might have appeared in scripture, even if they have no interest in the scripture itself. And there's nothing here to interfere with the worship practices and restraints upon their own behavior of those who are devout.
There are actually things of value coming out of the wisdom traditions, even if there are some people who claim to be adherents but who act mean, judgmental, or stupid.
It's all about how you treat people and how you preserve your own respectability. Why glossy sectarian institutes are needed for such lessons is mystifying. Teachings like this have been around for millennia, and not just coming out of church.
Do we really want to reinvent society in the image of the first century? That's akin to the Taliban's arch-reactionary plan, to turn back the clock 1000+ years. Whose life would be better if this were to happen? Not mine or anyone I know, sure as hell.Posted by Kuya on 2006-01-13 18:47:21

David,
"I donPosted by luminous beauty on 2006-01-13 10:14:12

For sure, David. That's what I thought.Posted by wileywitch on 2006-01-13 08:16:45

Wiley,
I have never been to a "character building" seminar.
Maybe I wasn't too clear. When I told my grandmother what I was doing, what I was doing was making a post on a forum about "character building" seminars. Sorry for the confusion.
I don't need a seminar, I am a character :)Posted by David in Canada on 2006-01-13 07:04:50

Thank you for iterating those points, Dave. Going from general to specific where demographics and statistics are concerned is often fallacious thinking.
A complete rejection of "religion" or "spirutuality" is as religious and often feverish as any "religion" or "spiritual path".
I'm thinking I should meet the Quakers in this town. Can't beat 'em for consistency in the anti-war category.
Sooooo, are you saying that you were at a "character building" seminar? You're such a straight man, David, I can't tell when you're pulling my leg.
I just sent my grandma an e-mail. I'd thought for ages that she was Catholic because she used to work as an editor for a Catholic newsletter. Not only was she not a practicing Catholic---did she have stories to tell! Whoa!
She's more spirtual than the Pope, anyway. That woman is a Saint!Posted by wileywitch on 2006-01-12 22:54:02

You probably wonPosted by David in Canada on 2006-01-12 20:32:26

So I guess my points are :
Not all people of faith are hypocritical people of faith.
Not all people of faith are DO AS I SAY people of faith.Posted by David in Canada on 2006-01-12 20:21:37

Hi Hifi,
Thanks for your response.
conformity, submissiveness to authority
Another Mennonite school days story if I may.
We had mandatory Bible Study classes as part of our curriculum. In the Bible class one day I started arguing with the teacher about an interpretation he was making. He seemed to brush off my challenge to his authority and moved on to another matter. That was fine, I had made my point. When the class was being dismissed he said " David, I would like to speak to you." and I expected to be reprimanded for what I had done. I was delighted when he commended my questioning of his authority and urged me to continue to do so.Posted by David in Canada on 2006-01-12 14:15:49

David, I myself grew up in Salt Lake City Mormon culture in the 50's, so I know whereof you speak. You might as well be describing life in the Soviet Union, Iran or China, though. Any sufficiently clamped down society is going to exhibit good manners, conformity, submissiveness to authority, and many will internalize the repression...
The notion of what amounts to good manners is a conservative relative, not allowing for change (i.e., no jazz, no rock n roll, no long hair, sexism, racsim, on and on....). But this is America, good manners are nice to haves, but those are not our core values.
My main point is that changing society has a better chance at making across the board improvements in social harmony than locking people up (literally and figurtively). In the bargain we not only retain, but advance, the social progress, innovation and individual liberties which, if anything, have been the true hallmarks of American greatness.Posted by Hifi on 2006-01-12 11:02:46

I have to speak up here in defence of religious fantasy , as Hifi calls it.
When I was in high school I, and some of my friends, went to a private Mennonite School. I also had friends who were in public schools. Most of the kids at the Mennonite School came from Mennonite families but there were some secular kids there too. Strength of character was a valuable lesson in which we were given instruction, at school and at church too.
The public schools set up nursery programs for teenage mothers. We did not need nursery programs at my school since there were no pregnant teenage mothers. The public schools councilors were overwhelmed with students who had problems with drugs, divorced parents, behavioral issues, poor grades and attendance. The councilors at my school were ready and able to deal with the same problems but had only a very small fraction of these types of problems.
I did a two years in the Mennonite school and then three in a public school. Talk about culture shock. Kids mouthing off to teachers, fights amongst themselves, drugs being bought and sold and teachers and administrators who seemed to be at a loss to correct the situation.
Character is something we build in ourselves. Having the right tools helps.Posted by David in Canada on 2006-01-12 09:34:37

Nice data Hifi. It has also been shown since the alleged elections that the red states have much higher incidences of divorce, abortion, etc.
I do, however, think that it is not accurate or fair to assume that that this holds true (or not) for individuals. Many religious people do take the gamble-on-God-instead-of-dealing-with-this-world approach. There are some, however, who believe that dealing with reality as it is can be a spirtual calling (not something to impose on others, btw.) You probably won't find such people at "character building" seminars.
Responsible adults don't call God to bail them out of the bed they made, and they don't burst into tears during their husband's confirmation hearing. Jiminy Cricket.Posted by wileywitch on 2006-01-11 20:01:12

As a "refugee" from Christian fundamentalism myself, I find it deeply disturbing that these folks are now hiding behind front groups to promote their theology. It's really quite creepy and cult-like, IMO (http://www.refocus.org for more information re. the psychological appeal and impact of cults.)
I ran across a very informative article about Founding Father William Penn today (http://www.quaker.org/wmpenn.html) that I think offers Americans the only true "antidote" to tyranny (of any sort). The last paragraph of the article sums it all up very succinctly:
" By creating Pennsylvania, Penn set an enormously important example for liberty....He showed how individuals of different races and religions can live together peacefully ***when they mind their own business***." [Emphasis mine.]
That, after all, is the whole problem, isn't it? The Rabid Right's two top issues--abortion and gay marriage--are prime examples of how the Fundies want to mind everyone else's business. And they've arrived at the point where they want to use government as a tool to help them do just that.Posted by Skye12 on 2006-01-11 17:04:52

If you want to rely on hard data, instead of religious fantasy, this study pretty much sums it up
.
1. Journal of Religion and Society: Cross-National Correlations of Quantifiable Societal Health with Popular Religiosity and Secularism in the Prosperous Democracies
http://moses.creighton.edu/JRS/2005/2005-11.html
Excerpts:
"The data examined in this study demonstrates that only the more secular, pro-evolution democracies have, for the first time in history, come closest to achieving practical Posted by Hifi on 2006-01-11 11:02:40

Oh, hi Tell on.Posted by wileywitch on 2006-01-11 10:41:51

I felt the same way, Tell on, when I was a child and my mother dragged me to Southern Baptist church services and tent revivals. The congregations struck me as being Pharisees and Phillistines then. Now I just think they're awful.
I personally thought that the lesson of the Good Samaritan was pretty clear. Those Baptists were either reading stuff that wasn't there, or skimming over stuff that was while directly contradicting the beautitudes. It appears that they haven't changed much.
Some of them apparently thought that they were better than Jesus, they didn't drink or dance.
Yep, Jesus would clear the White House and take up with the street people and tax collectors.
I'll play, Tell on---What is character?
I'd put a willingness to look at ones faults and weaknesses and a desire to improve. The flip-side would be a willingness to look at ones strengths and a desire to use them wisely.Posted by wileywitch on 2006-01-11 10:41:09

I think what this article lacks is a clear statement from CTI as to what it considers "character".
What freaked me out most was the presumption of "four areas of God-ordained jurisdiction: parents, government, church leaders, and employers" - eek!
"Honour thy Father and Mother" I'm familiar with, but I'm pretty certain that the bible doesn't command me to honour any of the rest of those folk, other than in its ongoing message that I should love my neighbour as myself and do unto others as I would have them do unto me, which in itself suggests I respect and care for those around me - but not surrender myself to their jurisdiction!
When we begin to believe that our democratically elected government is God-ordained, that's when it's time to emigrate to another planet - even the Pope doesn't claim to be infallible all the time, why should any secular leader claim a Divine ordination?
As for Church Leaders - well, which Church? Am thinking the writer of this sentence didn't have the local mosque or synagogue in mind... Not that I particularly care, but if all Church Leaders are God-ordained, why can't they all agree or at least find some common ground?
And the truly scary bit - just because someone runs a business, they have a God-ordained jurisdiction over their employees? What a power rush! What an idiotic idea!
Hi Crashtech - as to whether or not it's wrong to make moral judgements, what about "judge not lest ye be judged", or even "let he who is without sin cast the first stone"? The way I see it, too many people are quick to identify the mote in their neighbour's eye rather than the beam in their own. I believe I am my brother's keeper, but only as far as love and compassion inform me. If I am informed by a sense of self-righteousness or anger, I should examine my own sin first - I'm not saying I should be passive in the face of something I honestly believe is wrong, but I should be clear about my own motivation and in my own conscience before I act.
What I find most repugnant about a lot of the US Christian Right is that their attitudes are consistently unloving and, basically, unchristian. I don't know how so many people who claim to "know Jesus" can be taken in by the very people he'd have thrown out of the temple.
I know little of Islam, but I often wonder if the majority of Muslims feel about the Taliban the way I feel about the US Christian Right!Posted by Tell on 2006-01-11 09:49:25

Who is "we", yuri? Just curious. There's a lot of room for interpretation in your post.
It seems to me that the crime rate in the U.S. has steadily declined in the last decade (don't have any reports on hand) though crime is being reported much more on television newscasts.
And what are the great afflictions in the U.S. that makes so many people want most people to flock unto the church for instruction?
Hmmm. Let's see----homosexuality, sex before marriage, pornography, prostitution, recreational drug use, abortion----things that primarily offend evangelical "Christians". I never hear calls to crack down on murder (unless you count fetuses, but what is the death toll for Iraqi fetuses?), rape, white collar crime, war crimes, etc.
Is it just me, or does a certain minority in the U.S. want the government to uphold their beliefs for them? Oh, ye of little faith. I wonder if the profits from running this character- building seminar are taxed.Posted by wileywitch on 2006-01-10 21:22:05

two points
1) its ridiculous to accuse this guy of putting forth biblical ideals. e.g., the roman centurion is hardly offered up in the bible or christian tradition as a model of character, unless you count (in tradition) marcellus and the 40 who were killed for refusing to fight for the emporer. Or the idea that rebellion against established human authority is the sin of witchcraft, particularly when you consider that between Christ and Constantine Christians were guilty of treason against the Roman civic Gods. In fact, what this guy is doing is more like the idea of the Roman civic Gods than anything in the bible or Christian tradition before Geneva. This is Calvinist, but this is relatively recent (1500s), hardly something attributable to the bible, Christianity as a whole, or a new "reconstructionist Christian" idealogy, but instead the work of one whackjob in Geneva. Unfortunately, this whackjobs followers were all kicked out of europe into america.
2) What if the guy actually was putting out a notion of Character that did follow biblical ideals? That would be a hell of a lot more progressive than anything coming out the democratic leadership. Have you ever read the sermon on the mount? Real progressiveness involves a rejection of individualism; individualism is fundamentally nonprogressive because it rejects any debt you owe the other people. Individualism leads to poor wages and the rape of the environment, as well as any other vice you can think of. Genuinely Christian values consistent of seeking something other than your own personal good. As I see it, the war in iraq is a result of the people in power seeking their own good. pollution likewise, low wages likewise. the death penalty. global warming. dresden. hiroshima. the cutting down of the rainforests. People act with no sense of debt to their neighbours or to their progeny. That is, the problem with this Gothard guy is not his alleged attack on individualism, but that his attack is not thorough enough.He attacks the individualism of the people at the bottom; carried to its extremes this leads to fascism like Hitler or Stalin. The individualism of the people on top is more invidious and should be more attacked. Biblical ideals (and to be fair, a lot of non-/extra-/pre-/ and post- biblical ideals too) can contribute to a less individualistic, more just society.
Progressives need to think clearer and attack the right problems. This guy sucks not because he wants to build biblical ideals but because he is thoroughly opposed to the heart of biblical ideals. THe problem is not his attack on individualism, but rather that he leaves it preserved, creating individual sheep subverted to a wolf.Posted by jroberts on 2006-01-10 21:17:11

In God's dreams, we have become a nightmare!Posted by bohdan yuri on 2006-01-10 20:50:58

Just one little point crashtech (hi, crashtech)---there is no discrete entitity called godlessness that is or is not required for a person to be humane.Posted by wileywitch on 2006-01-10 11:48:45

crashtech;
The door is open for you to offer an alternative. Unless you just want someone else to do your thinking for you. Do you believe that moral development is something that is imposed from on high, or is it a consequence of one's own reflection and personal growth?Posted by luminous beauty on 2006-01-10 11:35:21

The connection the article tries to make is that these groups somehow want to brainwash people into mindless obedience. What I see is that nearly two generations have gone by where the popular thinking has been that it is wrong to make moral judgements. The result of this is that kids grow up without much of a moral foundation to guide their actions, and groups like this have rushed in to fill the vacuum.
Typical of articles on this site, no alternative is offered, just a gloomy assessment of how things are going terribly awry. Could this be because the alternatives have failed? Where are the humanist academies and their glossy posters? Could it be that godlessness has been been found lacking, and now people are returning to their roots? How will progressives answer this challenge?Posted by crashtech on 2006-01-10 09:03:16

I admit, I didn't read this closely. It seems like it's about time for these group scams to get fired up again. God forbid that someone might think that they are part of a society and forces that are bigger than individuals, with or without God. It's just a hop, skip, and a jump away from facing that to questioning the nature and quality of our relationships.
I'll take this as a good sign. For there to be enough people who will pay a few gran to have their individuality removed, methinks there must be a whole lot more people questioning.
A question a friend once asked me sums it up pretty well---If you believed, absolutely that you had a technique or philosophy that would make the world a better place, or save it, then what would you charge for it?
Next time someone asks me if I want a "free personality test" I'll say what I've always said, No, thank you. I'm sure I have one." In this case, No, thank you. I've got enough character, as it is.Posted by wileywitch on 2006-01-09 20:38:46

Pretty much what one would expect, actually. People generally love to be told what to do and how to think. It's much easier than figuring it all out oneself.
Of course this thought only came to me after I stopped laughing, was able to breathe again and cleaned up the ice tea that shot out my nose when I read that somewhere in Oklahoma (where else?) there's a chaplain named Argyle Dick.
Now that's a sock monkey!Posted by opeluboy on 2006-01-09 17:11:03